Class Action Suit Against Apple And AT&T For Lack Of MMS On iPhones

By cwaltersAugust 21, 2009

No matter how awesome the iPhone is at multimedia, gaming, or taking money out of your wallet and mailing it to AT&T and Apple, it still doesn’t let you use multimedia messaging service (MMS)—you know, that thing where you send a photo to a friend over text message. Earlier this year AT&T finally said it would happen by the end of summer, but now a group of customers in Louisiana are tired of waiting.

A class action started in a Louisana district court alleging that Apple and AT&T touted the iPhone as supporting MMS (multimedia messaging service) but have not as yet provided the service.

The plaintiffs allege that Apple “advertised heavily that the new version of iPhone, the 3G, as well as the even newer version the 3G-S would allow MMS. Apple’s print and video advertisements in and on television, the internet, the radio, newspapers and direct mailers all touted the availability of MMS.” AT&T advertised the same functionality, the filing says.

Earlier this year AT&T stated vehemently that the only delay in getting MMS functionality up and running was that they had to manually switch over everyone’s accounts in order to avoid billing mistakes. That’s right: there’s no MMS yet, here in the final days of August, beacause AT&T has a room of temps furiously going through and adjusting the billing settings on customer account records.

But TD Daily notes, “Apple, says the filings, has revealed that AT&T has never upgraded its towers so as to support MMS functionality.”

According to TG Daily, the suit “will consist of at least 10,000 individuals.”